libertybrewcity
03-01-2011, 07:37 PM
Scientists Buy Rocket Rides to Suborbital Space
http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/wiredscience/2011/02/spaceshiptwo-virgin-galactic.jpg
Two companies promising routine suborbital access have signed the first-ever contracts to ferry researchers beyond the Earth’s limb and into space.
Virgin Galactic, a suborbital-spaceflight company that’s building a spaceport in New Mexico, will fly at least two Southwest Research Institute researchers and their experiments into space at a cost of $200,000 per person. The institution has also reached a deal with XCOR Aerospace for six researcher seats on suborbital flights at $100,000 each.
“No one has ever offered any contracts to fly scientific researchers into suborbital space before,” said planetary scientist Alan Stern of SwRI. “This breaks the ice and not in a small way. This is the beginning to what I think is going to be a huge market for routine access to space.”
Virgin Galactic’s suborbital vehicle, SpaceShipTwo, will rocket two pilots and six paying customers about 68 miles above the Earth to provide about four minutes of zero-gravity flight. The company is building six ships, and each can haul more than 2,000 pounds of cargo into space.
Accounting for the weight of pilots and passengers, that leaves hundreds of pounds for scientific experiments.
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/02/suborbital-spaceflight-research/
http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/wiredscience/2011/02/spaceshiptwo-virgin-galactic.jpg
Two companies promising routine suborbital access have signed the first-ever contracts to ferry researchers beyond the Earth’s limb and into space.
Virgin Galactic, a suborbital-spaceflight company that’s building a spaceport in New Mexico, will fly at least two Southwest Research Institute researchers and their experiments into space at a cost of $200,000 per person. The institution has also reached a deal with XCOR Aerospace for six researcher seats on suborbital flights at $100,000 each.
“No one has ever offered any contracts to fly scientific researchers into suborbital space before,” said planetary scientist Alan Stern of SwRI. “This breaks the ice and not in a small way. This is the beginning to what I think is going to be a huge market for routine access to space.”
Virgin Galactic’s suborbital vehicle, SpaceShipTwo, will rocket two pilots and six paying customers about 68 miles above the Earth to provide about four minutes of zero-gravity flight. The company is building six ships, and each can haul more than 2,000 pounds of cargo into space.
Accounting for the weight of pilots and passengers, that leaves hundreds of pounds for scientific experiments.
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/02/suborbital-spaceflight-research/